WHITE TIGER PASS

Essential Reads on Female Empowerment, an Inspiring Book for Every Woman's Journey

by Xuemo

Pub Date: May 13th, 2025
ISBN: 9798889910183

In rural China of 30 years ago, three young women struggle against the customs of their time and place.

Prolific author Xuemo has written extensively about the Chinese peasantry and the situations of women in its society. The novel follows two sisters-in-law, Ying’er Chen and Lanlan Chen, and Yue’er, whose story comes later. Ying’er and Lanlan are caught in a “swap” marriage, a practice by which Ying’er married Hantou, the eldest son of the Chen family, while the Chens’ daughter, Lanlan, was married off to Ying’er’s brother, who proved to be abusive. Soon widowed, Ying’er is left with a son, the issue of her and her true love, Lingguan, Hantou’s young brother, who then decamped to the big city. Now Lanlan has moved back home and wants a divorce from her abusive mate, Bai Fu, and the Chens want to see their widowed daughter-in-law remarried while she’s still young (and regardless, they want to keep their cherished grandson). Bai Fu wants his wife back, and this swap-marriage custom complicates everything enormously. We must also mention Mengzi, another Chen son who is desperate to find a wife. All of these people are just scraping by, so money becomes an obsession in the corner of the desert, Shawan, “where even wolves won’t shit.” Then gold is discovered at White Tiger Pass, the rush is on, and Shawan will never be the same again. Money, or its absence, is also a catalyst fueling deception, jealousy, envy, all the nasty emotions. Ying’er and Lanlan decide to head for the salt fields deep in the desert to make money and become more independent; it’s an epic trek where being besieged by jackals is only one terrifying detail. Yue’er’s part, almost an addendum, presents the love story of her and Mengzi.

This book contains almost everything possible in its emotional reach, complicated plot, and rampant philosophizing. The author seems incapable of reining in his storytelling urges, which unspool luxuriously. One wishes that Xuemo had a merciless editor to do a lot of chopping. The themes in the book are clear: the devastating effects of poverty and the evils of greed. As one might guess, the gold rush is a mixed blessing; riches for some and the end of an older, simpler life for others. One hesitates to talk about verbal style since this is a translation, butcan assume that the pungent aphorisms and metaphors reflect a certain literary and cultural tradition. For instance, someone is described as “a little donkey frightened by its own farts” (flatulence seems a very popular allusion), and we are told that “even your teeth fight with your tongue sometimes.” The whole idea of swap marriages could be a comic opera setup, but these are grim rather than humorous proceedings. Indeed, fatalism seems to be the reigning philosophy, and after this saga of unrelenting adversity and misery, one understands how it would be seductively attractive. There is a good amount of superstition involved and even magical realism. Xuemo is very popular in China, with a prodigious output. A long, annotated list of his publications (see back matter) attests to a one-man spiritual and cultural phenomenon. It’s not surprising that, like Cher and Prince and Madonna, he sports just one name.

Some may be turned off by this emotional ultramarathon of a book, but others may relish every mile.